Yesterday, I spent an hour and a half on Chicago’s South Side with a Black community leader and his beautiful wife. I had met him years ago while lobbying in Springfield, and something about him stayed with me.

Some people carry fire. If you’ve ever walked through your own fire, you recognize it immediately.

They’re the builders. The ones who refuse to quit on their communities no matter how difficult things become. That’s why I wanted to reconnect… I felt a thread in him like I have in me that just won’t allow us to give up.

We had uncomfortable conversations. The kind most people avoid. The kind I love.

Because truth usually lives on the other side of discomfort.

We talked about the Black-Jewish relationship. We talked about the Civil Rights Movement. We talked about trust. Pain. History. Disappointment.

And then he said something that stopped me cold.

Many in the Black community feel abandoned by the Jewish community.

I had never really considered that. Because if you ask many Jews, they’ll tell you a different story. They’ll tell you they felt pushed out. They’ll tell you they stood shoulder to shoulder during the Civil Rights Movement, only to feel increasingly isolated decades later.

Then October 7 happened. And many Jews looked around asking: “Where........

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